Just because I'm smiling doesn't mean I'm not in pain
Navigating the Layered Stigma of Chronic Pain and Suicidality in Social Worlds
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3668615 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Kate Laforge (0000-0002-0402-3301, University of California, San Francisco, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 34 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 92-107 |
| Publication date | 2025-01-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Health Sociology Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1446-1242 • E-ISSN: 1839-3551 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/14461242.2024.2398250 |
| PMID | 39279051 |
| OpenAlex | W4402555179 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
| References cited | 54 |
This article aims to provide an illustrated account of layered stigmatisation processes and consequences for those who experience chronic pain and accompanying suicidality. Using constructivist grounded theory, I draw from 20 in-depth interviews conducted from 2022 to 2023 to explore how chronic pain and suicidality operate within people's social worlds. Findings demonstrate how layered stigmatising processes, occurring based on chronic pain and suicidality, operate consistently across multiple social arenas to create interactional troubles, which result in enduring negative social, emotional, and financial impacts. Three themes were constructed, including (1) self-stigma and the multiple roles of the family, (2) missed connections, and (3) anticipated stigma and workplace discrimination. Taken together, themes support the overarching category, 'interactional troubles'. Findings suggest a need for attunement to stigmatising processes' omnipresence and the depth of their consequences. Clinical interventions may benefit from emphasizing participants' social worlds and incorporating the complexity of navigating social arenas given layered stigmatisation. Moreover, policies that support those with chronic pain and mental illness could offset the long-term negative economic consequences of discrimination
Attunement · Chronic pain · Grounded theory · Omnipresence · Psychiatry · Psychological intervention · Psychotherapist · Qualitative research · Social support · Sociology · Healthcare professionals’ stress and burnout · Medicine · Musculoskeletal pain and rehabilitation · Psychology · Social Psychology · Suicide and Self-Harm Studies
Stigma of visible and invisible chronic conditions
A classification of chronic pain for ICD-11
Prevalence of Chronic Pain and High-Impact Chronic Pain Among Adults — United States, 2016
The paradox of self-stigma and mental illness.
Purposeful Sampling for Qualitative Data Collection and Analysis in Mixed Method Implementation Research
Qualitative inquiry and research design
Family consequences of chronic back pain
Suicide communication events
Rethinking the sociology of stigma
Health maintenance, meaning, and disrupted illness trajectories in people with low back pain
Agents in time
This really explains my case
On Illegitimacy, Suffering and Recognition
Sociology of Chronic Pain
The Stigma Complex
Experiencing chronic widespread pain in a family context
On the Margins of the Periphery
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 2 |
| Citation span | 2025 - 2026 (2) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |